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1. Secrets that are widely known don't stay secret for long. Snowden leaked a lot of documents and none of them said the government was doing this already. 2.

1. Secrets that are widely known don't stay secret for long. Snowden leaked a lot of documents and none of them said the government was doing this already. 2. The data that is out there is _very_ messy. If you have a unique name and you use it as your twitter handle, sure, this is already happening. It's called Klout. But most companies just use it to figure out what image to put on their coupons. 3. I've never heard of employers asking for someones "trustwrothiness score". We as a society get pretty pissy about this type of thing. We've banned IQ tests, and needlessly asking for credit reports / scores. If a metric like this came out in wide use we'd ban it. 4. License agreements are generally unenforcible. You don't get the right to someones car just because you put it in a license agreement. If you could do that there would be lots of scams trying to get old grandpa to install a new photo app to see his grandkids. 5. What is going on in China is overblown in the media. It's not a episode of Black Mirror. The people that are most impacted by it are politically loud young adults online, but the vast, vast majority of Chinese don't worry about it. There are much more important human rights concerns in China that need addressing like freedom of the press. 6. We're not in a nightmare phase, we're in the same phase we've always been in. The telegraph cables were tapped by every major government, the radios listened to, the phones tapped, we even put recording equipment into televisions we sold overseas, our major hotels have always been tapped (or easily tapped given a court order if a foreign national was in town). This has been happening for over a hundred years. I agree we should know about it (thank you Snowden) and in some cases I don't like it, but the solution isn't to wish it away, it's to use encryption and not say or do stupid things around computers.

mrSugar 10y ago
What about just not saying or doing stupid things at all?
paulmd 10y ago
> 3. We've banned ... needlessly asking for credit reports / scores. No, it's perfectly legal for employers to run a credit report on you and make a hiring decision on that basis. You're outright incorrect here. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryhannon/2013/03/16/has-your-credit-report-cost-you-a-job/#21383887102d http://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryhannon/2013/03/16/has-your-... > 4. License agreements are generally unenforcible. Good luck proving that in court. Especially when you just also agreed to mandatory binding arbitration instead of a court hearing. It's not even a situation of you not being able to mount a defense against a billion-dollar corporation, you will literally never have the chance to have a lawyer in the room with you in any sort of hearing.
- 3pt14159 10y ago
  3. It's banned almost everywhere in the western world except for America. California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, and NYC have banned it unless it's needed for the job (i.e. they give you a credit card) and even the states where it is legal it's still not used for non-sensitive positions or responsibilities, and if it started to become widespread there they'd ban it there too. 4. It has been proved in court countless times when the terms have been ruled out of scope. You need to have meeting of the minds in contracts. You cannot unknowingly agree to binding arbitration either. This is just FUD. Show me the court case or the media storm when little Sally lost all her money because she unwittingly agreed to some completely unreasonable ToS. The infringing company would get countersued by an attorney working on commission. Not that you can't get fucked by the courts and contracts in America, you most certainly can, but not by these unenforceable / unreasonable ToS.
  - DashRattlesnake 10y ago
    > You cannot unknowingly agree to binding arbitration either. I'm pretty sure that's not true. Hasn't Wells Fargo managed to use binding arbitration clauses to successfully dodge lawsuits about the accounts they fraudulently opened? https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/business/dealbook/wells-fargo-killing-sham-account-suits-by-using-arbitration.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/business/dealbook/wells-f... Those contracts are large, rarely read, often use lots of technical jargon, and are subject to being unilaterally changed by the issuing party. Hardly anyone understands everything they're "agreeing" to.
marcosdumay 10y ago
> Secrets that are widely known don't stay secret for long. From the Carnivore and the big NSA installations in the late 90's to Snowden there were more than 10 years. That may not be "long" on your definition, but isn't something to dismiss. > We're not in a nightmare phase, we're in the same phase we've always been in. The current situation is clearly different from those you point. We never had universal surveillance in history, as it only became possible very recently. It's not a "nightmare phase", but it is unprecedentedly and nobody knows where it will lead. The solution isn't just to use encryption (although yes, using encryption is part of the solution), there's some deep political transformation going on, and any solution will only arrive by mixing technological and social factors.

mrSugar 10y ago

What about just not saying or doing stupid things at all?

paulmd 10y ago

> 3. We've banned ... needlessly asking for credit reports / scores. No, it's perfectly legal for employers to run a credit report on you and make a hiring decision on that basis. You're outright incorrect here. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryhannon/2013/03/16/has-your-credit-report-cost-you-a-job/#21383887102d http://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryhannon/2013/03/16/has-your-... > 4. License agreements are generally unenforcible. Good luck proving that in court. Especially when you just also agreed to mandatory binding arbitration instead of a court hearing. It's not even a situation of you not being able to mount a defense against a billion-dollar corporation, you will literally never have the chance to have a lawyer in the room with you in any sort of hearing.

3pt14159 10y ago
3. It's banned almost everywhere in the western world except for America. California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, and NYC have banned it unless it's needed for the job (i.e. they give you a credit card) and even the states where it is legal it's still not used for non-sensitive positions or responsibilities, and if it started to become widespread there they'd ban it there too. 4. It has been proved in court countless times when the terms have been ruled out of scope. You need to have meeting of the minds in contracts. You cannot unknowingly agree to binding arbitration either. This is just FUD. Show me the court case or the media storm when little Sally lost all her money because she unwittingly agreed to some completely unreasonable ToS. The infringing company would get countersued by an attorney working on commission. Not that you can't get fucked by the courts and contracts in America, you most certainly can, but not by these unenforceable / unreasonable ToS.
- DashRattlesnake 10y ago
  > You cannot unknowingly agree to binding arbitration either. I'm pretty sure that's not true. Hasn't Wells Fargo managed to use binding arbitration clauses to successfully dodge lawsuits about the accounts they fraudulently opened? https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/business/dealbook/wells-fargo-killing-sham-account-suits-by-using-arbitration.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/06/business/dealbook/wells-f... Those contracts are large, rarely read, often use lots of technical jargon, and are subject to being unilaterally changed by the issuing party. Hardly anyone understands everything they're "agreeing" to.

marcosdumay 10y ago

> Secrets that are widely known don't stay secret for long. From the Carnivore and the big NSA installations in the late 90's to Snowden there were more than 10 years. That may not be "long" on your definition, but isn't something to dismiss. > We're not in a nightmare phase, we're in the same phase we've always been in. The current situation is clearly different from those you point. We never had universal surveillance in history, as it only became possible very recently. It's not a "nightmare phase", but it is unprecedentedly and nobody knows where it will lead. The solution isn't just to use encryption (although yes, using encryption is part of the solution), there's some deep political transformation going on, and any solution will only arrive by mixing technological and social factors.